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“Sam?” Dooley cried. “Oh, no, he’s having an affair with a woman named Sam!”

“He’s not having an affair!” Vesta stressed. “Oh, for Pete’s sakes. Will you listen before you jump to conclusions?”

“Sam?” said Max with a frown. “Isn’t that the pigeon we just met?”

“The one who said that Tex is a miracle worker?” Dooley asked.

“Oh, so you met Sam, did you? And what did he tell you?” asked Vesta.

“Well, he said that he’d broken his wing, and how Tex fixed it up, and saved his life, and how Tex has saved plenty of other animals’ lives since.”

“I actually walked in on him playing the banjo to Sam, to cheer him up, and so he had to come clean. But can you see the dilemma we’re facing? Our doctor here wants to transfer his medical skills from the human species to the animal kingdom, and I keep telling him that if he really wants to go through with this, he needs to think long and hard, and tell his family and his patients.”

“I told you, I’m not ready to tell them yet,” said Tex. “And before you two butt in, let me tell you that things aren’t completely clear in my own head yet, and I think they should be, before I involve other people, all right?”

“All right, all right,” said Max, holding up an appeasing paw. “Take it easy. We’re not here to tell you what to do. We’re only here out of concern for your wellbeing.”

“We thought he was an alcoholic,” Dooley repeated.

“I’m still not fully convinced that he isn’t,” said Max, and now took a tentative sniff from the cup of coffee Tex had placed in the sink. “Mh… “ he said. “No alcohol, Dooley.”

“Let me smell,” said Max’s friend, but soon came to the same conclusion.

“Look, Tex has been under a lot of pressure,” said Vesta. “Which is why he’s been drinking a little too much. But that doesn’t make him a full-blown alcoholic. Far from it.”

Tex dragged a weary hand through his white mane.“I’ve been working with patients—human patients—all of my professional life, and for some reason I just hit a point last month where I suddenly felt that enough was enough. And then Sam came along, and it felt so good to treat his broken wing and nurse him back to health. I mean, animals are so grateful for the least little thing you do for them. They don’t complain that you didn’t prescribe them the medication they read about on WebMD, or they don’t drop by at all hours of the day or night with some imaginary disease they think they might have developed. And they certainly don’t accost you at Costco when you’re standing at the checkout counter, and strip down their pants to show you the suspicious mole they discovered that morning. I mean, humans can be so… exasperating, while animals are the exact opposite. So I’ve been giving this a lot of thought, and I’m dropping my license and becoming a vet.”

Both Max and Dooley stared at the doctor, then Dooley said,“He is an alcoholic, Max. A raging one.”

“No, I think he’s lucid right now, Dooley,” said Max. “I don’t think he’s under the influence.”

“But… he can’t give up his license. What are his patients going to do?”

“They’ll find another doctor,” said Vesta. “Plenty of talented physicians in the world to take Tex’s place. Isn’t that a fact?”

“Oh, sure,” said her son-in-law. “Some young whippersnapper will jump at the chance to take over my practice.”

“But we already have a vet,” said Dooley.

“And we don’t need a second one,” Max added.

“Yes, we hate Vena, and we like Tex,” Dooley explained. “And if Tex becomes like Vena, we’ll have to hate Tex, too, and we don’t want to hate Tex, do we, Max?”

“No, we want to keep on liking Tex, and keep on hating Vena.”

Vesta rolled her eyes.“This is all getting very, very complicated.” That’s what you get, of course, she thought, when you promise to keep a person’s secret a secret. “Look, nothing has been decided yet. So you two don’t go blabbing until Tex has decided one way or another, all right?”

“All right, Gran,” said Max and Dooley in unison.

“I mean it. Not to Harriet, not to Brutus, and not to any of your other little friends.”

Both cats looked pained at having to make such a promise, but finally nodded dutifully.

“Good. Though I still think you should tell your wife and your daughter, Tex.”

“I will—when I’m ready,” said the doctor, stubborn as ever.

Just then a loud voice called out,“Yoo-hoo! Doctor Poole? Where are you, Doctor Poole?”

Tex emitted a tired groan.“Ida,” he said. “Just what I need right now.” He was referring to Ida Baumgartner, one of his most loyal patients.

Vesta patted the man’s back as they left the kitchen. “At moments like these I think becoming a vet is not such a bad idea after all, son.”

20

I have to confess I found this all very difficult. A cat’s natural instinct is to go blab about anything they pick up over the course of a day, and now we’d specifically been told to curb our inclination to spread this hot bit of gossip far and wide—tough! So I think Dooley and I could be excused for coming away from this meeting feeling more thana little dazed and confused.